Release Notes

2015-12-12 Release Notes

New Features

Major Update: Application module

The application module is now in alpha as an add-on to Leads. You now now create applications for enrollment. We still have some polishing to do, but it is ready to start building your online applications. This module may also be incorporated into the Leads process so you can keep track of both inquiries and applications from one central location. Please let us know if you would like to learn more.

Major Update: Email Address Update

Email Addresses are no longer shared between People. This means that if one person updates his/her email address it won’t update for anyone else. This was required for added security around anonymous logins, which we now allow for online applications.

Major Update: New Login Screen

Login screens have been updated to fit better on screens and look better overall.

Additionally, administrators now have the ability to allow users to sign up for the BigSIS portal without being required to send them a signup link via email. Administrators have the option of turning on this new feature in client settings that allow users to go to the login screen and create a user account that is tied to the email address on record for the person signing up. For example, suppose you have added a person record for Jon with the email address jon@someemail.com, Jon can now go to the login screen, supply his email address and have his signup link sent directly to his email address on his own.

This new login screen also works with the new application module allowing prospective families to create user accounts even if they have not submitted an inquiry yet and even if they do not have person records already in BigSIS. This way, brand new prospective families can sign up and log on to track their inquiries, applications, and contracts even if they previously did not have a person record in the system.

Added the ability to upload and store pictures for people. Pictures can be stored in person and lead records.

Work phone numbers have been added to the employee directory.

Some changes were made to the resource calendar for events that may require some users to re-enter their resources. The ability to add resources to events has been revamped, greatly improving functionality and user experience. Adding resources to events is now easier and more intuitive. We also fixed a bug that was not warning users when a resource was already being used for a particular time slot.

Calendars can now be set to be hidden (i.e., OFF) by default. The calendars that are set to be hidden by default will still display on the calendar page but will be greyed when a user first comes to the page. Users can then turn them ON by clicking on them if they want to. See here: http://goo.gl/fQ4pbK

Alerts have been added to Lead inquiries so that you may now designate who on your team is alerted via email when a new inquiry comes in via the new Leads module.

A new Leads tab has been added to person records so if a parent/guardian is associated with any lead, the lead will be accessible directly from the parent’s/guardian’s person record. See here: http://goo.gl/tv5u9n

You can now create copies of existing leads.

Improved the way matrixes display in the printed assessment report if both a scale and a description were used in the matrix.

Added the ability to generate a report for a single course while still preserving the report that prints all courses. Prior to this, if you printed a report for all courses and then printed a report for a single course, the latter would overwrite the former in the portal so that you could only display one or the other report in the portal for any given term. These reports no longer overwrite each other.

Added the ability for teachers to view sent emails and drafts in the portal.

Added the ability to display attendance by course in assessment reports.

Added a quick view for leads. This allows you to view all the vital information for a lead in one single location and print it if so desired. See here: http://goo.gl/y8tMfr

Added a key to the leads ribbon to aid users in understanding what all the different colors mean in the ribbon. See here: http://goo.gl/DknPI3

Email accounts now include a separate field for “Display Name” to make the email account settings a little more intuitive. Prior to this update, both the “From Email Address” and the “Display Name” were combined in one field like this: Martin Chamorro – BigSIS Support <support@bigsis.com> but they are now each in their own distinct fields instead. See here for a clear illustration: http://screencast.com/t/Ebgtkh0gw3D

An option was added to the system filter “Guardian of Student in School Year” to ignore current student status.

Added a new employee importer so that you can now import employee data from an external source.

Email types (e.g., business, personal, etc.) are now part of the person reconciler, this means that when doing an import of a person, you can now specify the type of email they have.

Fixes

Fixed an outlier issue when students had multiple admission records displaying incorrect classes on their transcripts when the student was enrolled in two separate concurrent terms

In the Gradebook module, descriptions are no longer required when creating assignments

Corrected an issue where matrix scale items were not obeying their orders in a few places in the portal

Fixed an issue preventing pledges from using pledge templates correctly

Added a note to the portal informing portal uses that they must contact the administration in order to hide their addresses from publication in directories

When teachers send emails to the parents of their students from the portal the email markers should now correctly display the data associated with the proper recipient of the email. There was an issue where the markers for both email recipients were using the same data but this is no longer the case